


It's Fate, Darling

by anno_Hreog



Category: X-Men (Movieverse), X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, F/M, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-06-21
Updated: 2013-06-30
Packaged: 2017-12-15 16:34:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 4
Words: 14,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/851656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anno_Hreog/pseuds/anno_Hreog
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Charles grows up in Westchester. He has Raven, but he also has Cain. </p><p>Oh, the life of a society omega.  Then there's Erik, and later Logan Howlett. And Erik again. </p><p>Or, Charles has family, and friends, and still ends up accidentally bonded to an irate Alpha at a black-tie event. Only, it's not very accidental. </p><p> </p><p>For the sadly deleted kinkmeme prompt: <i>ultimately Charles/ERIK unintentional alpha-omega bonding fic, with Kurt scheming to get the Xavier money, and using the weird Charles/Cain vibe to do it, in which Charles is not a slutty omega, he just has a lot of REASONS for sleeping with a lot of people he doesn’t actually hate.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Cain

**Author's Note:**

> This is going to be slow and meandering, while I work out my Charles/Cain, Charles/+Raven issues. Ultimately Erik, but then, I figure, it's going to wander off and be Charles/Logan occasionally.
> 
> Just my own rambling take on A/O dynamics.

The first time Charles Xavier ran away from home was a week before his mother’s wedding.

He had been very good up till then, quiet certainly, but agreeable and good-natured, one of those rare children who knew how to keep themselves amused and to make themselves scarce before you even knew you wanted them to. It was almost as if he could read your mind.

His father had died when he was seven. 

Sharon Xavier, lost in grief and turning to the comfort of a cut-crystal glass filled with forgetfulness, found another hand over hers one night over her drink, found that hand pushing up her skirt and tearing at her undergarments in a way that was disgusting and exciting. Brian never— 

Most of what happened next faded in a haze of rough fumbling and a bruise she found the next morning on the hard-to-look back of her thigh. She didn’t remember much, except that it hurt in just the right way, and she needed that, as much as she needed the burn of scotch down her throat, and how it killed her memories, synapse by synapse. Kurt was like that when he shoved inside and went at it like a battering ram at the castle gates.

Charles, on the other hand, forgot nothing, if he couldn’t understand exactly what it was about. Not that night, or the one after that and the next…

… until Constanza, who worked the upstairs, was suiting him up in that uncomfortable shirt and jacket, knotting his tie with an angry frown and trying not to think, _terrible terrible thing, too soon, poor poor Mrs Xavier,_ in front of him that for a second Charles thought he was being bundled off to his mother’s funeral, and his insides wanted to scream and shatter --

 _Stop_ , said Brain. _Calm down._

He drew in a deep breath and sent out a wobbly tendril of a thought, and sighed in relief. Mommy was just in the other wing. And soon he was there too, Constanza letting go of his hand at the door and abandoning him to the Den of Scotch. Where Mommy went to be SAD.

But there was no smell of scotch lingering in the air that morning, only the smell of a newly mowed lawn, of summer wafting in through an open window, the overwhelming scent of cut roses in the Lalique vase, and Joy! perfume, which meant something special was about to happen.

Sharon, dressed in pink tweed and pearls — _Mommy was so pretty_ — was giddily introducing “father’s friend Mr. Marko,” with a girlish titter — ridiculous, for a woman her age intruded a brusque thought with an almost palpable slap of annoyance — and Charles gulped.

“He’s going to be your new daddy,” his mother chattered on, with a nervous flutter in her voice, “and you have a new brother, too. You’ve always wanted a brother, didn’t you Charles? Oh, Kurt, it’s the sweetest thing. Charles so wanted a brother when he was, oh, four or five, I think, and Brian had the hardest time explaining that even if he did get a new brother, he wouldn’t be older than Charles was. It just wasn’t possible. And now look at the two of you. Aren’t they just adorable together?”

And the mountain of angry thoughts was standing up, face shadowed in the backlight, and as Charles looked up and up and up, the shadow lifted from the crags of Mr. Marko’s forced smile, and he saw — he saw —

_— hot, heavy breath in her neck, pushing her legs apart, grabbing the swell of her ass, not so old, still some juices left in the stuck-up bitch, won’t be a complete chore, but think of the money, buck up, stud, bring her home, that’s it, give it to her good —_

And Charles screamed and screamed and screamed, and turned to run, and instead ran straight into, well, not a mountain, but certainly a solid hillock of a boy, who shoved him hard, twice, and Charles hit the carpet face first —

_— Mommy’s cheek digging into the carpet, moaning and gasping, bitch in heat, just begging for it, wet and loose, begging for me to plant a baby in her, not another ugly mewling infant, the selfish bitch, selfish breeding omega bitch —_

“What’s the matter with this kid?” the hillock demanded. “I barely touched him. I swear! I didn’t do nothing, Pop, I swear I didn’t touch him! OWWW! Don’t hit me. I didn’t, I swear!”

That was all Charles heard before he blacked out. It was a day of many firsts.

 

Some experts in the field of mutant development contend that early manifestation requires a catalyst, and the most effective ones, unfortunate but necessarily, involve pain.

For Charles Xavier, who had manifested at birth and had been quietly read the moods and feelings of his hired caregivers as he had progressed from diapers to rompers, a catalyst to draw out his mutant powers was perhaps an overkill.

But it was a good as time as any to start learning how to shield.

 

That night, Charles packed his first runaway bag.

In the kitchen, Marie Jose hadn’t said anything, just made him a duck and watercress sandwich when he wandered into the kitchen after dinner. She wrapped it up in wax paper, and threw in a juicebox (apple cranberry, not grape, yuck) and package of chocolate chip cookies, without Charles even asking. They were the store-bought kind that Charles liked.

She didn’t even seem to catch on when he, oh so casually, asked how buses worked, and even showed him what a token was and explained how people used it.

He could do the rest on his own. An extra sweater in case he got cold. He would wear his rubber boots in case it rained. Toothbrush, toothpaste, but he had forgotten the floss. He always forgot to floss – and considering Brain didn’t allow him to forget things, he assumed this was intentional on Brain’s part.

He would figure all that out later. Charles was going to run away, take the bus instead of asking Carter to drive him, so they wouldn’t find out where he went. He was going to go all the way down to New York City, and go to live in the Museum. They had artifacts there, and knowledge. He would do research on Brain during the day, and sleep in Napoleon’s bed at night. He’d read about it in a book.

The door to his bathroom was ajar, and the light was on.

That was odd. The house had thirteen bathrooms – a number that Dad used to joke about, and still secretly scared Mommy – and no one used Charles’ bathroom but him.

He nudged the door open and stepped in. A rush of anger swarmed at him, and bowled him over –

_\-- hate this place, hate their snooty, rich, too-good-for-you faces, ‘m not a thug, ‘m not stupid, hate them all, burn the place to the ground --_

“—what the hell do you want? Do you just go barging in everywhere?” yelled the hillock.

Charles wanted nothing more than to crawl inside his own skin and hide, but he stood up to the hillock. Be calm. Be brave.

“s’ my bathroom,” he said. At least his voice sounded brave.

That only seemed to make the hillock more furious, if that was even possible. The feelings swelled up and threatened to crush him.

_\-- think they own everything, smarmy, butter won’t melt in his mouth, the little pipsqueak, hate, hate, hate --_

“Don’t hit me!” yelped Charles, and the hillock stopped short and looked at his fist, which had been clenched but still stuck to the hillock’s thick side.

“I wasn’t going to hurt you,” growled the hillock through clenched teeth. “Pop won’t have it. He’d have whaled on me – not that I hurt you before. Hey, what gives, bawling like that in the parlor? You bought me a world of trouble, pipsqueak –”

 _Not a pipsqueak_ , Brain insisted and stood up taller than even Charles was. He was bigger on the inside. He, Charles Xavier was the bigger man. He could be.

“Charles, Charles Xavier” said Charles and thrust out his hand. He knew how to do this.

The hillock stared at it, then him, then back at the hand again, and mumbled, “Cain. Cain Marko.”

And he unclenched his fist and cautiously extended his hand, before he looked at it, how thick his knuckles were, how grey his calluses were, how ugly and coarse compared to Charles’ nice neat hand, and fuming, he hid it behind his back.

That was when Charles noticed the swell of purple turning to yellow around the hillock’s eye — Cain, his name is Cain — and the faded bruises on the cheek orthogonal to that. (Charles had been reading the dictionary for amusement)

And as the tide of rage deflated, like a soufflé that failed to rise, Charles was awash in a pool of confusion and shame and hate, not his, swirling around but not toward Charles, and he reached out, in spite of himself, to brush his fingertips against that fresh shiner, sending out thoughts like kittens and fluffy pillows and Mommy’s perfume, before the fist swung out.

Charles didn’t even see it coming, didn’t anticipate it, only felt the back of his head knocked against the wall tile. A trickle rolled down his broken lip.

“Now look at what you made me do!” yelled Cain, before he remembered to quiet down. He knelt down in front of Charles and hissed, “What are you, some kind of freak pussy? What’d you go around touching a guy for? You were just asking for that! Just plain asking for it.”

And Charles could feel an equal maelstrom of anger building up inside him, great enough to knock out this awful bully – and he deserved it, too! – and he was about to let loose when he stopped, and remembered –

_— Mommy, so SAD all the time, and hurt, hurt, so hurt inside, wrap herself away in the hurt, and craving pain and burning, so awful, so good –_

and he saw Cain’s eye and his discolored cheek, and how it felt sitting inside that tornado of hate. Like being a very small mouse, but when you screamed you could knock things down too. Cain whirled on him, furious, anxious, scared, spitting mad, stupid—

No wonder Cain exploded all the time, when he felt so _awful_ inside. And Charles decided then and there. Brain didn’t do all his thinking for him. 

“I just – ”

He took a deep breath and tried again.

“Do you want a cookie?”

Cain just looked stupid ~~er.~~

“What?”

Charles reached for his runaway bag; it was just outside the door.

“’Cause I have some. In my bag.”

Cain confuddled didn’t look that different from his usual look – Charles allowed himself that much; what was he, _Saint Charles?_

But he didn’t blow up again, and Charles patted the bathroon rug patiently, and let this big, awful boy sit down next to him.

“Want to share?” said Charles. “Because I got a whole bag of stuff – ” he held up his hand to stop Cain’s immediate outburst “—and I accidentally packed all your cookies, too. I don’t want to go back downstairs to put them back. Do you mind if we have them here?”

Cain was just smart enough not to say anything more, quietly wait while Charles rummaged around in his runaway bag. And they sat together, their backs warming the cold bathroom tiles, until they finished all the cookies.

The crumbs washed down with the blood on Charles’s lip, and they tasted like the memory of kisses.

  
§  


It wasn't as if they became best friends, or even good friends after that. Charles wasn't sure he liked being brothers all the time, now that he had Cain as one. 

Cain was ecstatic one moment, morose and broody the next, and you never knew when, in the middle of a game, Cain would turn around and hit you. His fits of temper were sporadic, so sudden they were a blind spot on the gentle cast of Charles' mental sensors. 

He was hiding from Cain that day. 

Cain couldn't play all the games. Chess enraged him -- he remembered the rules of the pieces half the times, but was too impatient to plan moves ahead, and each time Charles took a pawn or a rook, or god forbid a knight, Cain would go apoplectic with fury.

 _He doesn't want to look stupid_ , Charles told himself. 

_He_ is _stupid,_ said _Brain_.

So, more often then not, Charles would end up setting the board for himself and play against _Brain_. 

"What are you doing? Let's go outside." 

The wide grin on Cain's face faltered and dropped away at the sight of the chess board. 

"Why didn't you ask me to play?" he demanded. "What's going on?"

"I didn't think you'd enjoy it --" Charles started, but Cain was already gearing up, self-loathing spitting and whirling and looking for an outlet.

"Don't think I'm smart enough? Don't think I'm good enough to play your namby pamby game is that it?" He kicked over the board. "You think you're better than me? You're nothing you little pipsqueak, nothing but money glossed over nothing, that's all you are. You think you're better, is that it?"

"I _know_ I'm better than you," said Charles quietly, and immediately clamped down on it. He still had a temper and a fierce sense of pride; he'd hoped _Brain_ would help him control it, but it seemed _Brain_ had a healthy dose of pride as well.

It was a matter of seconds, Charles feeling the pang of regret as Cain's face fell -- _words have power_ said _Brain. The mind is stronger than the fist_ \-- and Cain's animal hurt geared up to strike, and Charles was sorry, he was sorry he hurt Cain's feelings, but he didn't want to be beaten, he didn't want to be hurt back, and he was tired of all this _shouting_ all the time --

"Hey? Where did you go? What's going on? Is this some sneak trick?"

Charles blinked, and carefully tiptoed around Cain. The larger boy didn't see him, spinning around in a jerky motion as if Charles was just around the corner of his eye, and swinging out blindly. Charles moved out of his range and circled Cain. He wriggled his fingers closer, and jumped back as Cain stumbled towards him.

Cain didn't see him. He was invisible!

He left Cain fumbling around and yelling in the library, and raced out into the foyer. A long gilt mirror hung over the fireplace, and Charles had to climb on top of a chair to look into it.

His reflection stared back at him. He wasn't invisible after all. The thudding in the hallway alerted him to Cain on his trail, and Charles dashed down the stairs. He could hear Cain shouting at him. Apparently his invisibility had a range, and he wasn't putting himself near Cain to test it out, not now.

But he could work on this. He just needed to concentrate, somewhere quiet.

All across second floor, Cain was opening and slamming doors, and bellowing at the top of his lungs before Mommy poked her head out of the music room. After that, the noise dropped to dead silence, though a grey mist of annoyance spread out.

Charles crouched in the cupboard, leaning against a wall of canned goods and tried to empty his mind. Clear it out to a clean slate, _think_ invisible. 

Over the course of the afternoon, five people opened the cupboard and rummaged for things and let the door close, all without seeing Charles. He almost called out when Marie Jose scanned the shelves for condensed milk -- _she was going to make flan! No, Charles, keep still_ \-- and turned without noticing him. 

He'd done it. Charles wasn't invisible, but he could make people _not_ see him. 

_If people don't think they see you, if their brains are told not to register your presence, doesn't that mean you're invisible?_

Charles turned this thought over and over in his head until he was dizzy and he thought his mind would stretch so much it would spill everything sensible inside. In the end he fell asleep.

It was darker when he blinked awake, and despite having napped sitting up against canned goods, he felt wonderful. It was dusk, that lovely witching hour when the blue all around was shot through with mysterious shadows. 

(That was Dad talking. Dad loved dusk. He loved beautiful, intangible things. He loved sitting with Mommy in the gazebo when the afternoon light snuck secret messages to the night.)

And now Mommy was sitting alone in the music room cradling The Scotch, and ANGRY -- 

\-- before Charles could fall headlong into the memory, the now, the SAD, he noticed something moving outside the cupboard. He sat up and peered through the open door, slowly making his way out.

Someone was poking around the kitchen. It was difficult to tell -- there seemed to be only an outline in the halfway dark topped by a flame of red. Except for that the figure was almost invisible in the eerie shade of dusk.

For a moment, Charles wondered if he was dreaming, and in his dreams he was seeing himself going invisible and fading into the night. 

But it wasn't a dream. This was a girl, and she was blue.

 

Then she was not.

In a flurry of scales, he was staring at himself, then Marie Jose, then himself again. Finally the blue girl was back, with a look of abject terror in her face, as if she hadn't done the most amazing thing in the world.

A smile broke out on Charles's face, and seeing that, the girl looked a tad less scared, but before either of them could say anything, a bellow accompanied by the thud of an angry rhinoceros came charging down the downstairs hallway, and on instinct Charles pulled the blue girl into the cupboard with him. She huddled close, holding him as if she was scared, but when he thought at her, _it's all right, it's going to be all right_ , she looked up and stifled a giggle.

"We have to be quiet," Charles whispered, and she nodded in agreement. They didn't say anymore because in five seconds Cain had come stomping into the kitchen, roaring, "CHARLIE! CHARLIE, YOU CAN'T HIDE FOREVER!"

They could hear him stomping around the kitchen, sending pots and pans clattering to the floor -- Martya was not going to be happy about that tomorrow -- until finally he swung open door to the cupboard, and Charles winced. 

In hindsight, he supposed, Charles could have blinked out of Cain's sight. He could have talked him down, pretended it had all been a game, _ducked_ when Cain's fists responded before Charles could gently suggest to him what to think. But it was sudden and his mind was a cornered rabbit.

But before Cain could yell, before Charles could stop him, a flurry of blue disentangled from him and stood before Cain: Tall, imposing, condescending Kurt Marko.

"What is the meaning of this racket?" Kurt's voice wasn't quite the same, but it was loud and it was commanding, and that was enough to get Cain to cower. "Get out of here, boy. Go to your room!"

Cain didn't stop to question. He didn't suspect. He just turned and ran, as if the ersatz Kurt had threatened him with a beating.

When the footsteps died away, Kurt vanished in a fluttering of scales, and Charles and the blue girl were left in the middle of the kitchen in silent awe, Charles's mind processing what had happened -- _if you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable_ \-- 

But what was impossible? What was improbable? The common bounds of that were opened wide until it seemed the possibilities were boundless upon the whole world, no, the whole universe, and Charles' mind was delirious with the idea. So wondrous, so beautiful, so great --

He must have been lost inside his own head for too long because the girl looked uncertain again, and Charles saw how the lines of tension were woven into her skin, poised to flee at the slightest sign of anger or fear.

But when she met his look, the tension broke, and they both burst into giggles at once.

  
§  


Her name was Raven, and Charles knew how this would go on the spot.

"You must be my sister. You'll live here with us," he said, so firmly that in the next moment, she seemed to believe that statement.

"Your secret sister?" she asked, still shy.

Charles thought of how large the house was. "Maybe that would be prudent at first." He was considering the practical terms, which bedroom was empty, how to avoid Kurt, if he could make Cain look the other way, where they could play, that he didn't notice her face fall as the scales shifted across her face.

Then, the blue girl was gone, and in her place was a child a few years younger, about six, with cream and rose cheeks and shiny blond hair. 

Raven jumped up and grabbed his hand. "Let's go play in the music room!" she said and before he could Raven jumped up and grabbed his hand. And before he could protest, they were running up the stairs and plopped down on the padded bench.

“I always wanted to play the piano,” said Raven, and she smashed the keys together in a terrible cacophony all the way up to the high notes, not minding that she was making a ruckus. She seemed caught up in a manic glee, and her little girl curls bounced around her head. 

Charles taught her scales, Raven plinked out "Twinkle Twinkle" with one finger, and they were in the middle of harmonizing "Heart and Soul" together, when Charles felt shadow of a presence fall upon them before the door opened.

Raven turned first.

 

"Mommy?" 

Raven's voice wobbled, but instead of shrinking back as Charles expected her to, the shy girl reached out and held out her hands.

_Pick her up. Hug her. She's your daughter, she's your daughter, she's our Raven. Pick her up._

_Brain_ was sending out the signal so loud Charles thought he could see invisible waves rippling through the air at Mommy's head. Mommy stood there, an ice statue of frosty pink and pale gold. She was worse than still; Charles felt she was so straight and brittle that a single tremor would break her. He stopped. And upon release, Mommy turned and ran from the room.

Raven ran after her. The shy, scared girl was gone. She chased after Mommy, called after her in sing-song, "Mommy, Mommy, Mommy, Mommy!" and she hung from the doorknob of the locked door and kept at it. Inside, Charles could hear dry sobs and Mommy's horrified, choked gasps. 

_Was it_ so _hard to pick up a little girl? When she looks so sweet? Brain_ 's voice interjected.

 _That's not the point. It's not Mommy's way. She doesn't like it when I rumple her dress_ , Charles retorted, while he shuffled through his memories, desperately grabbed on to what he read, saw, heard, felt in the past, anything that could help.

 _You're just making excuses for her. Brain_ sounded smug. _Be sensible. Start small. You started this. See it through with least hurt to everyone._

Striding down the hallway, Charles thought calming thoughts, soothing sounds of waves, a hammock in the summer breeze, anything to get Mommy to calm down. Finally, when he felt her mind loosen its frightened grip and slip into sleep, he let out a deep sigh. 

Outside Mommy's bedroom, Raven's back was to him, and her shoulders slumped. All the anger rushed out of him, along with the talking to he'd intended on giving her, and tentatively he reached out to hug her from behind. Raven didn't turn around. He didn't ask her why, but she told him anyway.

"I wanted her to hug me." She sounded defiant. She wasn't going to say sorry.

"I know," he said, and buried his nose in her hair. It turned back to deep red where his breath blew on it.

"That tickles," she said, and he blew a raspberry on her neck. 

"Don't worry," he told her. "I have a plan."

He really didn’t.

 

Sneaking around wasn't really a plan, but it felt more like one as they put it in motion. 

For a week, Raven was out of the corner of your eye, a flash of peaches and cream in a skyblue dress. Sweet, pretty, innocent. Innocuous. Everyone saw her, and they really didn't. 

When their minds lingered to wonder, they got a quick message, _Oh, it's just Raven_ , and they went on their way.

It had taken Charles all night to make that, a slip of psychic resonance, a ribbon tied into Raven's hair that once you came close to her, your mind would pick up, unconsciously, and sensing no threat, would just shrug and move on. _Brain_ was the one who came up with that. 

_Most people don't care. It doesn't really affect them. So slip in the change there. So even when they do notice, it doesn't matter._

The more often they saw her, just for a second running out of Charles's room, eating sandwiches in the gazebo, rummaging around in the garage, the more she became an accepted part of the house, just one of the kids running around and getting underfoot. 

 

Family was going to be more of a challenge.

Charles made sure they avoided Mommy after that first disastrous run-in, but he couldn't keep it up forever. The house was awash in a vague psychic field that resonated, _It's just Raven. Our little girl. She belongs here_ , tinged with the smell of cookies and roses to make it more acceptable, Mommy had taken to her bed and not come out for days. 

Kurt didn't pay much notice, caught in his own angry thundercloud of grievances, except to be annoyed that Mommy was playing the invalid. _Again_ was the irate thought. 

But in the end, it was Cain who forced their hand.


	2. Raven

Raven was skimming stones in the swimming pool.

Charles lounged on a deck chair skimming through a stack of _Amazing Stories_ and _Nature_ and sipping lemonade, until, in the haze of the summer heat, science wove into science fiction and the threads were unraveling in a lovely doozy of a daydream.

"Charlie, look!”

That was all the warning he got. Charles was taken off guard. Half the time he was lucky if he even heard Cain barreling towards him. It was as if Cain’s too solid presence was so dense that it became a blank spot, a black hole for Charles’ mind. 

The swimming pool exploded in a splash, and water went up, geyser high, watering down the lemonade, soaking Charles, the magazines, Raven, oh _shit_ \--

Wheezing with laughter, Cain bobbed up, the smooth flat rocks falling like rain to pelting him along with globs of water. 

“Did ya see that, Charlie? Did you see – Look at you! You look like a drowned rat. You look like one of those stupid froofy dogs Sharons’ got yapping around the –”

A little whirlwind of fury, Raven launched herself into the pool and onto Cain’s head, punching and kicking. “You asshole! You stupid meathead!” Cain fought back – it was reflex for him, slug first, then second, then third, then maybe, after he cottoned on that Charles was bleeding from the nose, maybe ask questions.

“Stop, no, don’t hurt her, don’t –” Charles fell into the pool after them, wading out to separate the two, and realizing that Raven was pummeling Cain and holding his head underwater. Cain’s heavy arms flailed helplessly.

“Raven, no!” 

Raven’s elbow caught Charles in the nose – ow! – and hearing Charles cry out in pain, she stopped abruptly. 

“What was that for?”

“Oh, Charles, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to—”

“Not me.” Charles flapped his hands. Cain was slumped over his shoulder and coughing up pool water. The water buoyed up Cain’s dead weight, but just barely. “Him. Cain. What was that all about? Help me get him out of the pool. Oh god, what does he eat? Rocks?”

“Him? Raven sneered at Cain. “He’s an stupid bully. Don’t think I don’t see him use you like a punching bag half the week. Cain’s a _jerk_.” 

“All right, all right, will you give me a hand here?” Raven stood in the pool, her white dress floating up around her chest like petals, arms crossed and refusing to lift a finger, while Charles dragged Cain over to the edge and clambered up ladder. The water wasn't going to help him here. 

"Oh, all right, but I'm doing this for you, not for him."

They laid him out on the side of the pool like a beached whale, the baked concreted soaking with pool water and quickly evaporating in the day's heat. Raven wiped her fingers on her wet dress as if touching Cain's white clammy skin was poison.

"You're the soul of generosity, lovepuppy," said Charles dryly.

"Charles, you are _gross_. You are going to end up be sad and alone, mark my words."

"Yeah because I'll be in _prison_ because I killed my stepbrother, oh shit. I think he's stopped breathing. Quick. Give him CPR."

"What? No! That's disgusting! I'm not kissing him!"

"It's not kissing! It's CPR! I can't do it, I'm a boy!" 

"What, I have to do it because I'm a girl? Then it _is_ kissing!"

"Oh for Christ's sake--" He slammed down on Cain's chest and taking a mouthful of air, pinched Cain's nose, and covered his mouth with his. Pump, pump, blow, pump, pump, blow -- _Brain was going to have a field day with this_ \--

With a gasp, Cain half-sat up, fell back on the concrete with a thud, rolled to his side and started coughing. Sitting back on his heels, Charles sighed with relief. He wasn’t going to prison for fratricide. He didn't see Cain lunge for his neck.

Raven got there first, hands around Cain's neck, shaking him like a rag doll, and Charles had to throw himself between them again, prying apart her fingers. 

"No, Raven, stop! Stop! I just brought him back! _Stop!"_

All of a sudden Cain stopped, like a doll jerked back on marionette strings. He stared stupidly at Charles, then at Raven, then slowly back at Charles again. Behind him Charles could see, without turning to look, Raven sneering at his stepbrother's dull, slackjawed face, and Charles felt a sting of impatience. Did Cain _have to_ look so stupid? What was he doing, auditioning for Igor, the mindless lackey? 

Then he stopped himself. That wasn't Charles, and it wasn't _Brain_ , either. That was Kurt talking. 

"Charlie," said Cain slowly, looking blindly over Charles's shoulder. "Who's that?"

Charles’ gaze fixed on Cain’s dull, uncomprehending eyes. Shaking off the specter of Kurt, he tried to be calm, patient. “Cain, that’s Raven. Our Raven, remember? Our sister,” he spoke quiet, soft, soothing and turned to Raven to beg her to play along. 

She was blue.

He almost yelped. Charles glared at her to change back. She shook her head adamantly, holding her ground. Any other time, she might, but not now, not for Cain. 

“Our sister,” Cain repeated after him, and Charles turned his attention back to his stepbrother. Raven plopped herself beside him, staring intently into Cain’s face, grinning. _I hope his brain snaps, the moron_ , Charles could hear her think. She was practically screaming it. 

“Raven, stop that,” hissed Charles.

“Stop what? I’m just being me,” she mocked, singsong. “Raven, his sister.”

That seemed to snap Cain out of it, and he looked the way Charles sometimes caught him look, like a pitbull scared shitless, just before Kurt turned on him. Charles grabbed his chin, and forced Cain to look at him.

“Yes, Cain, this is Raven. Our sister –” his heart was beating so fast, his words spilled out solidifying, like drops of silver that rose to orbit around them, creating a new order, “Your sister first –” Raven honked, Charles didn’t have time for this, he had to fix this, fix Cain, fix everything, “Kurt and Mommy’s -- _Sharon’s_ , see? She’s _our_ sister, mine and yours. We’re all connected. She’s our family.”

“Our family,” repeated Cain, and nodded just as Charles nodded, and re-crossed his legs, lotus style, just like Charles. 

“I think you broke him,” said Raven, but Charles reached for her hand and tugged it, as she tried to squirm loose, and placed it over Cain’s. 

“See? Our sister, Raven.”

Cain nodded.

“Our sister, Raven.”

 

After that, there was no hiding and hoping to get away with it. For the rest of the day, Cain marched all over the house with Raven in tow, repeating, _our sister, Raven. This is our sister._

The staff accepted it readily enough. They had already gotten used to the idea that had been floating around the house for weeks, the little girl. The pretty little girl that went so well with the rest of the picture. Sharon, however, was another matter.

That night, she locked herself in her bedroom again and wouldn’t come out, not for dinner, not for the party at the club, not even when Kurt banged on the door and yelled.

Cain was still in his strange daze, sitting on the floor outside of Charles’ room, making a tower with a deck of cards. Raven had kicked him out, leaning against the door just in case he decided to push his way in. 

“Just like his father,” she said, adding with a snort. “ _My_ father. He's my father now. Great, just great. Great plan, Charles.”

She didn’t seem terribly upset. If anything, Raven seemed calmer, less ready to run scurrying for the woods. It was almost as if she had started believing it too, and strangely it made her happy. Already, the half-truth had settled.

“It happened too quickly, it was all I could come up with,” said Charles. “Now shut up, I have to concentrate. I have to make everyone believe it, too.”

Cain wasn’t the problem here. It was Momm -- _Sharon_. She had to be convinced. There was no looking back now. 

“What, you’re going to make Sharon think I’m really hers?” Charles shushed her – he didn’t catch the wistfulness in her voice. “How?”

“By giving her a strong memory. Shut up, okay, this is hard –” _Raven is your daughter, Raven is your daughter_. It needed to be something concrete. Small was okay. The mind could work with small, and string reasons and rationalizations around it.

“Of what?”

Charles sent out feelers through the house and found Mommy, no, _Sharon_ , sitting in front of her dressing table, brushing out her hair like a zombie – three-hundred twenty-one, three-hundred twenty-two – rocking back and forth, trying not to think, trying not to –

And then he saw it, stepped right into the chaos of memories and NOW and pain, all tangled up and doused with loathing. It was so close to the surface, _Sharon_ trying so hard not to think about it, that it was all she could think about, _about sleeping with Kurt, about lying to Brian, sneaking around, the excitement, the wonderfully filthy little secret, of feeling so decadent, having a lovely marriage and a delicious little affair all at once, and now, now she was trapped, and it wasn’t so delicious, and now Brian was gone, and she had lied, lied to him, and now she was stuck --_

“Of what, Charles?” Raven was saying. “What about? About having babies? About having _me_?”

And it fell and shattered, his concentration, like a delicate porcelain rabbit hitting the concrete of the poolside and shattering, sending its shards everywhere -- 

– _hot, heavy breath in her neck, pushing her legs apart, grabbing the swell of her ass – Raven, she’s your daughter – cheating, lying to Brian – just begging for it, plant a baby in her, another ugly mewling infant – Raven, your daughter – lies, lies, lies, I’m being punished, I’m being punished, I’m caught, I’m trapped, trapped into marriage with_ him, _because of the baby, that baby, my daughter, Raven_ \--

Charles didn’t feel the floor as it hit his face.

 

§

 

When Charles woke up, he was alone. Alone in his room, alone in his head, and for a terrifying moment, he thought his mind had gone silent.

He leaned back against the pillows. It was midday, the window was open, and outside, someone was mowing the grass. Voices, but he couldn't hear what they were saying, what they were doing, couldn't feel _them_. 

_Leodogran of Cameliard had one fair daughter,_  
and no other child,  
And she was the fairest of all flesh on earth,  
Guinevere, and in her is one delight. 

So, he wasn't broken. His mind still worked.

The door opened, and Charles braced himself. He couldn't remember the last time he didn't know who was on the other side of the door before they came it. Except for Cain. 

It wasn't Cain. It was just Constanza.

"I see you're awake." She set down a tray table laden with soup, fresh baked rolls, a glass of orange juice. "Eat up, now. You'll want to get out of that bed, go play outside -" She made a face "- in the library," she amended. 

"Is this all right?" he started on the soup anyway. Constanza snorted.

"Now himself will be going on about coddling you, and not having any weaklings in his house," she gave him a wink, "but we'll just let that pass, this once, all right? Now eat up. Don't get crumbs on your sheets."

"I won't." He sat up straight, leaning over the tray. "Where is everyone?” he asked cautiously. He didn’t _really_ think the house was abandoned, that they’d all left him behind with just Constanza to look after him, as if he’d had some incurable disease, as if he was living out a part in some horrible fairy tale, but it was strange not hearing anything. It made him think everyone was _dead_. 

“Everyone?” Constanza looked puzzled. “Well, the big _Man_ of the house is off at ‘work,’” she gave a half shrug, “that boy Cain is somewhere in the garage breaking something, I don’t know. The Missus took little Raven out for shopping and lunch. It’s Wednesday. You slept through a whole day.”

Charles looked down at his soup. Somehow he’d eaten it all. “Were they very worried?”

Constanza pursed her lips. “Mr Marko made a loud fuss, but the Missus didn’t let him call Dr. Sheridan. She said it was nothing serious.” She shook her head, and ended up smiling. “You probably don’t remember, but you used to fall asleep for long spells when you were just a tot.”

“I remember,” said Charles. It was harder to forget.

“Well, that’s because you’re such a bright little boy with a very big brain. Mister Xavier used to say you needed all the sleep you could get. You get your rest now.” They heard a loud bang and clatter, and winced. “Maybe don’t be in such a rush to get out just yet. Do you want anything? Books? A game maybe?”

Charles shook his head. “No, I’m all right. Thank you.” She left the orange juice by the bedside table, and left with the tray. He sat up looking outside the window until the light started to fade. He could hear voices coming and going, Cain stomping by in the hallway, and he strained for the higher register of Mo- _Sharon_ or Raven. But Sharon wouldn’t raise her voice so it carried. Kurt only paused to tell Cain to stop loitering, and with a kick at the door Cain left, too.

By evening, Charles had made up an epic saga out of the ships and roses pattern on the wallpaper. It was soothing not to hear people’s thoughts, like swimming out into the ocean, with a tube to buoy you up, with no clue as to where he was going and for how long. At the edges, he could feel their minds buzzing, but he left them like that, fuzzy and far away. It would come back, eventually, but right now, he would wallow in the luxury of feeling alone, of being alone.

 _You could be legion,_ said a faraway voice. _All that is your mind could become reality. You would be the beginning and the end. You are the will to power._ It almost sounded like Brain, but mixed in with Charles. Everyone was leaving him, or becoming absorbed in him. _How wonderful. How terrible._

“How boring.”

The door creaked open with the smell of dinner. 

“Charles, are you talking to yourself?” 

It was Raven. Her cream and roses little girl was too small for the tray, but she carried it easily. She was a lot stronger than she looked, and of all things, the walking post-child for ‘looks are deceiving.’ She set the tray on the bedside table with one hand, and crawled under the covers to curl up next to him. She smelled faintly of Shalimar, and there was a smudge of chocolate at the corner of her mouth. “Careful, it’s hot.”

Charles broke the shell of his shepherd’s pie, and watched the steam curl up from his fork. “Yum.”

Raven leaned over. “Can I have some?” 

He airplaned the next forkful into her mouth with all the noises, and she made a face at his babying. “Didn’t you have dinner already?” he asked.

She shook her head, then spoke with her mouth full. “Nope. Skipped, because I was too full. I had three desserts at lunch. And then Mommy and I tried on like a thousand dresses.”

“Did you buy them all?”

“No way, what do you think I am, a spoiled princess? I just got five. Wait till you see them. One of them’s a pink suit, and Mommy said I could wear her baby pearl set until I got my own. We’re going to match.”

“You’ll be like sisters,” he said, and she jabbed him with her elbow.

“That’s what you say to the _older_ one, dummy. Really, Charles, sad and alone. I called it first.” She clucked her tongue.

“Except for you,” said Charles. “You’ll come and visit, won’t you? When I’m in the lonely single people’s home?”

She snuggled up to his side and was about to say something when a loud kicking at the door interrupted them.

“Charlie, are you in there? Open up! Are you there?”

“Ugh,” Raven stuck out her tongue. “No one’s here. Go away.”

The pause on the other side went on for a second too long, and Raven gave Charles an incredulous look before they both burst out laughing.

“You’re lying!” yelled Cain. “I know you’re in there. I can hear you. I’m coming in.” 

“No!” Raven yelled back, and leapt out of the bed, her sudden movement almost upending the tray, and flung herself at the door to brace it. “Go away. Nobody wants you here!”

Cain banged harder on the door. “That’s a lie. Charlie’s in there. Charlie, can you hear me?”

“Oh my god, is there anyone who can’t hear you?” said an exasperated Raven. “Go. Away. Nobody wants you here.”

“That’s not true!” yelled Cain. “Charlie wants to see me. Nobody wants _you_ , you stupid bitch!”

The startled silence was all it took for Cain to push his way in, shoving past a stunned Raven. Raven took immediate revenge by leaping and tackling Cain before he made it to the bed. “Take that back! Take it back, you fucking shit!”

“Raven! Language!” Charles didn’t want to be an old lady here, but Raven at least _looked_ far too young for that.

“What? He’s the one who’s lying!” snarled Raven. “Who cares what fucking language? It’s English!”

“She lied first!” Cain kneed her in the stomach and Raven rolled to her side. “And I’m not lying. She’s a _mistake_! I heard ‘em saying--”

With a blood-curdling howl, Raven launched herself at Cain, trying to gouge out his eyes.

“Tell her, Charlie –”

“No, tell _him_ , Charles –”

“Wow, if I didn’t know the two of you,” said Charles sweetly, “I’d say you were each a spitting image of mother and father.”

That got them to spring apart, staring at each other aghast. Charles went back to his pot pie. It was lukewarm, but still edible. With a nasty look at Cain, Raven slunk over, figurative tail between her legs, crawled back into bed and slung Charles’ other arm around her. Charles let her. When Cain made a move to do the same on Charles’ other side, she bared her teeth and hissed. Charles didn’t have to look to know that Raven’s teeth were sharp as needles.

“Fuck off. Charles needs to eat.”

Instinctively Cain cowered. Then remembering himself, he rolled his shoulders and sneered back at her. “The fuck you know. Charles is… ambi. Ambi… Charles is ambi _fibian_. It means he can use both hands. Bitch.”

“Language,” Charles said automatically. He was going to be an old old lady before his time. And gender. “That’s _ambidextrous_ , but half points for trying.” 

Cain beamed, and Raven’s lip curled.

“That means you got it half wrong. Which is just a nice way of saying it’s all wrong. Right, Charles?” 

“Show her, Charlie. Show her you can use your fork with your left hand, too.”

“That’s not ambi _fibious_ ,” snapped Raven. “That’s just European.”

“Shut up, the hell you know.”

“No, you shut up.”

“No, you.”

“No, you.”

“Children, children.” Charles switched his fork to his other hand to eat, weighed down by Raven leaning on him. Cain was a good two years older than he was, and Raven was -- who knew how old she was? But he felt ancient wedged in the two of them. Cain was kneeling next to the bed, pressed against his other side, and Raven wouldn’t budge, lest Charles think of making room for Cain. “Charles is wondering what it’s like to be an only child,” he muttered. He didn’t say _again_ , not out loud.

Cain found him a notepad and ball-point pens, one red one green, and Charles wrote ‘Raven’ with one hand and ‘Cain’ with the other at the same time, and they started up talking on either side of him as he wrote out two competing stories for each.

Their minds were on the other side of the door, and he could open and close it any time. But he was afraid to touch the handle, lest it melt into his hand and melt down the whole door as well. He could change things in the real world, change them so what he thought, what he _willed into being_ became reality. But the slightest nudge sent falling a domino of changes, in directions he couldn’t predict or set right again, if such changes could be deemed either right or wrong. And looking at Raven nestled on one side, dropping off to sleep, startling awake only to kick out at invisible foes and Cain and catching Charles in the ankle instead, he wouldn’t go back on this one for the world. 

“Just be careful, okay,” he said to the top of Raven’s head. “Don’t let them hurt you.”

On the other side, his face smushed into the quilt, Cain grunted in his sleep.

 

§

 

To Raven's credit, she held on for eighteen months. 

Eighteen months during which she and Sharon were perfectly matched for the ladies who lunch; and Raven took piano lessons and practiced for two hours every afternoon until everyone begged her to stop; and Sharon locked herself in the music room and screamed and screamed that Raven was a monster until Kurt barked at Constanza to toss the little freaks in the car and drive them around the block a dozen times; and Raven insisted Charles help her take breakfast in bed up to 'Mommy' and Sharon sat up and started at them dazed, and had no idea who they were; and Sharon swept up Raven from behind and told her she was Mommy's favorite little girl, before trying to drown her in the bathtub.

Charles tried to drag Sharon away, tried to pry her fingers off of Raven as bubbles rose to the surface and Raven's limbs went limp, and in the hallway Cain laughed and laughed until he was rolling on his side and wheezing.

Then Sharon had turned and run to get dressed for dinner, as if nothing had happened, and Charles was wrapping a sopping Raven up in a bathtowel and a spider monkey hug. She was shivering and stone-faced, but she had enough piss left in her to poke a hand out of the terry cloth, give Cain the bird behind Charles' back, and kick the bathroom door shut in his face.

"You're stronger than she is," Charles said. "Why did you let her --" He tiptoed around and recoiled from the roiling stormcloud of her thoughts.

"You don't know everything, Charles," she said, then gave him a piercing look. "Don't. Charles. Whatever you're thinking of doing, don't. I want her to love me for me."

She refused to turn blue, even after she had gone to bed.

Sharon didn't let go of her drink all throughout dinner, her smile growing increasingly wider and brighter, her laughter sharper with a manic tinge, as she prodded Kurt on the state of the business, his failed ventures, and time he tried to ingratiate himself with Winston Frost at the club and got royally snubbed for his efforts.

"You looked so desperate, darling," Sharon said, waving her drink at his face. "Like a dog slobbering after a bone. It was really very funny, you know. Winston walking in that tight-arsed walk of his, and you breathing down his neck, as if you needed to sell him a used car with a dead prostitute in the trunk. Andrea and I were in stitches. What in the _world_ were you thinking?"

Charles stared at an invisible point in the table, worrying his way around Sharon's thoughts, but they were a jumble, and Raven's words were ringing in his head -- _Whatever you're thinking of doing, don't._ \-- and Cain was kicking him under the table.

"The old bird's gone cuckoo," Cain was gleeful. Kurt's fingers were trembling around his fork, and Cain was counting the seconds until the explosion, rocking back and forth in his chair in anticipation, and keeping up a whispered commentary.

"Bitch is completely off her rocker. She's gone through, what’s it, two bottles of red so far? Wait up, I think we're getting to the good part … oh yeah, dick, dick, dick, dick, dick..." 

Kurt gritted his teeth in between snapping at Sharon to just shut up, looking to have an aneurysm, while Sharon merrily lobbed insults at his manners, his upbringing, his lack of success in business, and his woeful inadequacies in bed. 

"I mean, a girl gets bored, darling," Sharon was saying. "Ramming in and out, and in and out, with your sweet little dick -- " Cain guffawed and crowed _score!_ "-- but there's such a thing as technique, and it's as if you're trying to prove something you're not. It's a matter of breeding, and you're just not very good at --"

You didn't have to be a telepath to know there was an explosion coming up, but when you were, and the volcano of Kurt's temper burst, you could deflect it so your stepfather's fist didn't hit your mother.

It landed instead, turning direction in mid-air when Kurt’s rage, boiling over, latched onto Cain, who had been chanting “dick dick dick” under his breath and hadn’t seen it coming. The blood that spurted out on the white linen tablecloth was mostly from Cain’s nose, but some of it was when his jaw clenched and he bit off the tip of his tongue. 

Cain screamed and shouted, terrible shrieking noises that sounded nothing human, as he rolled on the floor, kicking out at the legs of the massive dining room table and one broke. A cascade of china and crystal slid to crash down on the boy, while Kurt yelled and Sharon screamed, and the downstairs help came running in and added to the commotion.

In the storm of anger and pain and confusion that barged into Charles’ head, the turmoil outside and in, Kurt yelling at Cain for making a stupid fuss over nothing, and Sharon wishing they were all gone, gone, gone, so she could have a quiet, civilized evening for once, and upstairs Raven crying herself to sleep hiding under the covers to shut out the noise of fighting, all Charles wanted to do was to fix this, _fix it so it doesn’t hurt, so no one gets hurt, fix it so it’s all right_ , and another voice boomed, low and hollow as a gutted whale, pedantically pointing out that it was because he _fixed it_ in the first place that this was happening, and _fixing it_ would only lead to a greater catastrophe.

And Charles felt a great white cloud looming over the chaos of their thoughts, threatening to blank him out, and he couldn't stay. So he ran.


	3. Emma

Charles didn't have a plan. He usually didn't because he was cool-headed enough to notice a few years back, that whatever elaborate plan he cooked up, it usually went pear-shaped in execution. 

But he did have memory, one that sunk its delicate hooks into ancient personal history and dredged it up at opportune moments. In his head, he was eight again, and he was finally going through with running away from home.

First that involved a bus down to NYC, and then sneaking into the Metropolitan museum, Napoleon's toothbrush and Henry the VIII's bed. The details became more elaborate in his head as he made his way down the road. The less he could see, blinded by sweat and tears, the more he could conjure up in his head.

When he stopped to catch his breath and look around, he was lost. He wasn't sure where the bus stop would be -- somewhere farther down the road? buses ran everywhere, didn't they? But the houses were sparse here, mostly large estates with vast grounds so they would never have to bump into their neighbors. He wondered how far Constanza or Mary Jose would have to walk out at the end of each day to catch the bus. Maybe Carter gave them a ride. 

He was wearing his indoor shoes, and the thin soles were seeped through in the wet grass. 

Night had fallen -- it was past dinner time after all, and he heard the hooting of an owl, and when he looked up, he caught sight of a tower. 

He made his way past the shrubbery, taking care so the branches didn't swing back and slap him in the face, and marched across the grounds. 

He wasn't sure how to get back home, though he wasn't sure he wanted to go back yet. Nothing would change, and if he made things change, pushed a little there, nudge this idea around, it only seemed to make things worse. It wasn't the natural way of things. He meddled, too much it seemed. Maybe they would be better off without him. Raven had a home now. Everyone believed she was one of them, even Raven (most of the time). 

Charles was so lost in his thoughts he didn't feel it until he walked right into it. A bubble of emptiness. 

But it wasn't the quiet of his mind when he curled up inside to shield himself from other people. It was bleak and drained, and it felt as if his mind had gone dead.

Charles flailed, backtracked on the wet grass, and fell flat on his back. A shadow of white loomed over him, the spotlight of an enormous full moon pulsing behind the specter. 

Charles braced himself on his elbows.

It was a girl, not more than two years older than Charles, and the hem of her long white nightgown was stained with grass. She took a puff from her cigarette and flicked the ashes at him. 

"Oh, so you're the one wallowing in self pity. I thought it was me," she said, in a bored, dead voice. "Do it somewhere else, kid, you're getting snot on my mules. Go on then, scat."

That was when he saw that she had been crying.

 

The murderous, blood-tinged haze, however, wasn't coming from her.

From a distance came a crescendo of barking, not the excited sloppy family dog sort, but the kind of trained-to-kill professionalism that came with security company Dobermans. 

Charles scrambled to his feet and whirled around. No trees, nothing to climb up on. Charles grabbed her hand but she wouldn't budge. "We can't outrun them." 

"No shit," said the girl. Through the smudge of tear-tracks, she wasn't trying very hard to hide a smirk as she looked him up and down. "See, I told you to get lost. Now you're puppy kibble."

"What about you?" he fumed, but she just shrugged off one shoulder. "Doesn't matter."

Shooting her a furious look, Charles turned his gaze on the onrush of dogs and focused. Theirs weren't like human minds, but dog-training was a combination of dominance and word commands. It wasn't like reading minds. This was more projecting about thoughts, strong and simple, directly into three living beings.

_SIT._

The dogs skidded to a stop, and instantly plopped their butts on the ground.

_Good dogs. Now, DOWN._

They flopped down, paws parallel in front of them, bright black eyes watching him avidly. God was speaking to them, never before had it been so clear and all-encompassing. His lips weren't even moving.

One of the Dobermans let out a whine, and he scratched him behind the ears, and he flopped over to show his belly. 

_Go to bed_ , and the three turned and loped back to where they had come from, happy to be told clearly what to do. Now if only people were so simple.

"That's very clever," said the girl. "You did that all with your --" she tossed her cigarette on the grass, and made wriggly fingers at her temple. "I'm Emma," she said, presenting her hand to him, palm down, like Charles was supposed to kiss it. He made a face, and stomped out the cigarette butt instead.

"Don't bother. The sprinklers go on at night," she said, "Not that I care if the place burns down over night. Well, now that you've taken care of security, want to check out the family silver? I know the combination to Winston's safe, but he's just got his girly mags stashed in there."

"What? You want me to _burgle_ your house? Don't you live here?" 

She shrugged again. "Not for long. They're bundling me off by the end of the week. Yeah, you read that right. I know it's the loony bin, not boarding school. Hazel thinks she can still lie to me, the stupid cow. I know, she's my mother, blah blah, respect, blah. You've got no compunctions about reading my mind, do you, sugar? Maybe you're not so boring as you think you are. Yeah, yeah, I can read your mind back. Just read. Can't do that thing you do, though. Send." She looked him over, more critically this time. "Anyway, what you look like is seriously in need of a drink. Come on, Princess Caroline. Let’s get you out of those wet shoes."

 _Well, just long enough to catch my breath_ , he sent at her. _I wouldn't want to be an imposition. And only until I figure out what to do._.

"Show off," she muttered. "Just for that you're taking the bottom bunk."

 

The 'guest house' was a pink plastic 'princess' cottage behind the tennis court. Still, it was spacious enough to fit real bunk beds, a doll's tea party table set with four pink chairs (one broken), a real portable gas stove, and ten bottles of fifty-year-old scotch. The blankets on the bed smelled a bit musty. 

Emma served the drinks in Aynsley tea cups. Tired and cold, what Charles really wanted was some hot tea, but when the fumes hit his nose, it felt like going home, and he relished the soothing burn of the scotch down his throat. It was horrible, though, like what he imagined paint thinner would taste like. But he understood what lovely pain felt like now.

"Aw, does that remind you of mummy? How sweet." Emma cooed, and poured out another round. "Drink up. It's the good stuff."

"Won't your father be angry?”

“I was going to pour it all in the pool. Horrid waste it would have been, wouldn’t it, sweetie? See, I knew you’d like it. This way, they won’t have to have the pool cleaned. They should be thanking me.” Emma said without heat, waving her teacup at Charles.

“Is that why they’re sending you away?”

“Because I stole all the booze?” 

_Because you’re_ drinking _all the booze_ ,” Charles took another sip, savoring the taste on his tongue, which felt fuzzy and warm. It really grew on you, scotch. His thoughts grew mellow and bled out, like melted amber. _You’re too young to be drinking. And pushing drinks on minors._

Emma snorted. _And you’re too young to be thinking at people. Didn’t your mummy tell you it was terribly naughty?_

 _Mummy doesn’t know. Or she doesn’t want to know. I think she knows about it, though. I don’t know._ It was getting a bit mixed up. Charles lay his head down on the pillow and hoped the grainy things weren’t rat shit.

 _Didn’t you take a peak?_ Emma asked at him. She seemed to be taking to his telepathy remarkably well.

_Don’t want to._

_Afraid of what you’ll see? – oh, ho, you’ve already seen. Well, that’s the downside, I suppose. People’s thoughts really aren’t worth poking around for. It’s mostly nasty._ She sighed. _It helps if you despise them though. Your opinion’s got nowhere to go but down_.

 _Isn't it awful, hating people all the time?_ Charles didn’t want to be deliberately blind, but he struggled with the tangle of ideas, of seeing past the surface, of seeing the mess of emotions and confusion behind the anger. _It’s more complicated than that._

 _No shit, Pollyanna, I wish the world was as pretty as it pretended to be, too._ Emma's smile grew wider and her eyes were glinting. _Do you want to have sex with me?_

"WHAT?" 

_You were thinking about my breasts all this time. I’m a mind-reader, too, you know_. 

Charles dropped his teacup, and it created an unfortunate wet spot on his lap. With a snort of a laugh, Emma came over to sop it up with a doily, and Charles tried to stay out of reach of her fingers, edged farther off the bed, and desperately hopped over to one of the quarter size chairs. It had to be the one with the broken leg.

“Shit,” he gasped, as the seat hit the ground, and Emma was doubled over on the bed, laughing and hugging her stomach. 

Charles slammed his fists on the worn Persian carpet. “I _wasn’t_ thinking of your breasts!” 

“Your face! Oh my god, your face!” 

“I wasn’t!” he protested, but he couldn’t keep up the outrage. She pulled him up, and he glared at her with a frown that wouldn’t hold. Emma just poured him another drink.

 _Don’t worry, sugar. I know you weren’t. I was just having a little fun._ She held out her tea cup in return, and he poured hers to the brim. They were almost done with this bottle.

They lay back on the bed, teacups balanced on their clavicles, and stared up at the top bunk. Someone had written _Purple People Eater_ on the bottom of the mattress with a _pink_ glitter pen, and that seemed terribly _wrong_ to Charles at the moment. He tipped his teacup to sip without spilling.

 _You’re a funny little kid, aren't you?_ , Emma thought at him. 

_People think about sex a lot_. He didn’t make it a question. He didn’t have to add “with you,” either; she could read it off him.

“All the time,” she said. She seemed to be tired out all of a sudden.

“Wouldn’t your father be angry about that?”

“Who do you think’s doing it?” Emma drained her teacup, a line of scotch trailing down to her neck. 

Charles turned his head to stare at her. Sitting up felt impossible right now. _Your father had_ SEX _with you?_

 _Not so loud, honey. You’re giving me a headache_. She put her hand over her eyes, like a fainting damsel from an old movie. 

_EMMA_ , he shook her with his mind, and she scowled at him. 

_He might as well. He’s thinking about it all the time._

_Emma, that’s --_

She interrupted him, with a mental nudge like a steel glove pressing gently against his forehead.

_Darling, could you get us another bottle. I think we’re dry._

With a groan, Charles stretched out as far as he could – evidently, being drunk didn’t add telekinesis to your telepathy, although it _felt_ like it should. He pulled off his wet sock, and managed to roll another bottle within reach with his toes. Curled up on his left, Emma giggled. They didn’t bother with the teacups this time, and took turns swigging directly out of the bottle.

“How old are you by the way?” slurred Charles, and added. “It's just that I don't think you’re that much older than I am, and you shouldn’t treat me so much like a little kid.” _and maybe we should be friends._

“Sugar, you don’t ever ask a lady her age,” said Emma. _As for being friends… well, we’ll see about that. Maybe later. I need to see if you grow up cute first._ But he could tell, she thought they were already. Emma was twelve, too. She knew he’d read it from her mind, but she liked that he asked. “Do you want to touch my breasts now?”

“Emma, for god’s sake, _no_.”

“Say, _no thank you, Miss Frost_. It’s more polite.”

“Shut up.”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to suck your cock?”

_EMMA._

_It was just a question, Charles._

They drifted off to sleep after that. Charles woke up in the night to lean over and throw up on the carpet. After that Emma kept kicking him in the back, until he got up and dragged the stinking mess outside. When he came back, she had somehow migrated to the top bunk, and Charles had the bed all to himself. He missed the warmth, but not the kicking.

 

Before dawn, her brother Christian poked his head in, made a face at the smell, and smuggled them a box of cereal with promises for more.

Emma, hair disheveled, in a damp nightdress, but sitting ramrod straight in the pink plastic chair, nudged Charles, who looked significantly worse for wear and smelled of puke, none to discreetly under the table with her foot. 

_Christian's gay_ she thought at him. _If you play your cards right, maybe he'll let you suck_ his _cock_.

Charles glared at her. _If you're nice for the rest of the day, I'll send you a cake with a file in it._

She sighed and picked the raisins out of her Raisin Bran. _It's a mental hospital, not prison, Charles. I'm sure they have all the good drugs. You should be so lucky._

 

He was caught out some time after noon, and after a bath and a set of fresh clothes, was sent back home in one of Winston Frost’s Bentleys. Hazel Frost attempted at a spot of kindness with strangers’ children if not her own and held his hand. Emma looked out the window, bored and not saying a word. It was only three miles, and besides she carried on a silent conversation with Charles the whole way, interrupting him with mental jabs while he tried to be polite and think of innocuous things to say to Mrs Frost.

Sharon and Hazel carried on crying and thanking each other as if they were long lost friends, stopping only to take turns hugging Charles, as if he had been gone for a week instead of overnight, and exchange dinner invitations, while Kurt hovered and beamed in his greasy way, wondering how he could cultivate this newfound friendship. 

Emma hated Raven on sight, and Raven returned the favor. Their mothers discussed schools and extracurricular activities. Adrienne had given up ballet to take up riding. Cordelia’s clothes were just frightful. Raven was probably tone deaf. And wouldn’t Charles and Emma make a lovely little couple? 

 

That didn’t stop the Frosts from sending Emma away for ‘observation.’ 

Years later, Emma Frost confessed that it was in the Xavier estate’s blue sitting room, modeled after Whistler’s Peacock Room, that she came up the idea of a telepathic ‘companion service.’ It wasn’t breaking any laws, at least none that existed yet. 

It took a serious amount of wheedling to get Charles Xavier to join in on her scheme, and she couldn’t make it work without him. 

Perhaps it was his surprise at manifesting as an omega that finally tipped the scales.


	4. Charles

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter earns the fic's 'mature' ratings, though mostly it's in Charles' head. Sex ahoy! Oh, and he's underage here, so please be warned.

 

If Kurt Marko had counted on Sharon's new friendship with Hazel Frost to open new doors to old money for him, he was sorely mistaken. 

It was a tumultuous time in the Xavier-Marko household. For one thing, Sharon, momentarily lifting her head from the fog of alcohol that subsumed her, discovered that her husband had been running the family finances into the red for the last couple of years. The shock didn’t make her give up drink. But in one of her more drastic moods, Sharon called up the family lawyers and tied up the bulk of the Xavier money for until Charles came of age. The unlikely case that he would marry before then added a standard proviso in the small print. 

Because it had become uncomfortably clear, as the children entered their teens and Sharon and Kurt became more deeply estranged, that while Kurt treated all three with more or less equal degrees of indifference and contempt, Sharon had settled on her favorite. Kurt's brood were tainted, Cain beyond salvaging, and Raven, being half Kurt's (the family all believed now), more or less impossible. Only Brian’s child was deserving of attention. Only Charles should have everything, the others nothing. 

What the household felt more sorely, deep down to their bones, was the brief but horrible Regime of Stinginess that followed. It was beyond Sharon's imagination to turn a hand in the kitchen herself, but Mary Jose was under strict orders to pare down the grocery bill. Kurt was _not_ to build a nuclear bunker in the basement, and the swimming pool was dry that summer. 

Nobody was getting a car for their birthday, least of all Cain, whose grades had sent Kurt into an apoplectic rage, and now Raven, in a last ditch, convoluted attempt at trying to appease her mother by not being a sinkhole for money, was refusing to apply to Miss Porter's.

"I don't see why I have to be the one going away to boarding school," she complained. "It's forty thousand dollars a year, Charles, and Kurt's not going to shell out that much when it's not even college, so what's the point?"

They were in the library, Charles working his way through a set of Physics problems for next year. 

He had planned on spending the morning dragging both his siblings kicking and screaming through their appalling schoolwork. But Raven was plinking away at the piano, and Cain, pretending he had reading to do for whatever remedial course he was taking over the summer, was lying under the baby grand and kicking it a beat out of tune with whatever Raven was playing, which right now drifted into ‘it’s not easy being green.’ A cheap paperback of _The Great Gatsby_ was breaking its spine face down on the carpet.

“Nobody is going to skimp on your _education_ , Raven. It's for your own good," said Charles. He would have liked to attend an expensive school, but he'd already skipped two grades, and he and his teachers agreed he might as well breeze through high school and get into college early. He knew it didn't help Cain, Charles being two years younger but a year ahead of him in school, but for all the guilt he felt about it, he couldn't hold himself back. The only thing he could do was make sure Cain didn't fail another year.

"Who cares?" wailed Raven. "The way the well's dried up, I'm betting they're only sending one of us to college, and I don't fucking give a damn it’s not me. If it's beans on toast for lunch again, I swear, I am going to scream. No, I'm going to go out there and chomp up the lawn. That's it. I am so hungry, I am going to _die_."

Cain lost his arrhythmic beat and curled up chortling. "You stupid _cow_. Get it? Eat grass? Stupid cow? Hey, I can see your panties from here."

"Cain--" started Charles. 

"Shut up, Cain, you pig,” Raven trailed off. It was too hot to argue, and none of them dared turn on the air-conditioning. “Maybe I can get a job.”

“Who’d ever hire you?” Cain scoffed.

“I could be a model,” said Raven. "Charles, Charles! I could model! You could drive me around to shoots and be my chaperone!

“Raven, you’re too young –”

“You’re too fat, doughface,” said Cain, but Raven ignored him.

“No, but I could look older. I could look however they wanted!” 

“But then you’d _pfffft_ and go blue and who wants to see that freakshow?”

That was when Raven kicked him in the head, which prompted Cain to roll over, grab her ankle and pulled her off the bench for a knockdown brawl. At twelve, she was an even match for Cain’s hulking sixteen, and the two grappled, rolling and kicking and pulling hair. From the table, Charles sunk his head in his hands.

“If you break the Faience vase, mother will have you both locked in your rooms with nothing but water and vitamins,” said Charles, rather peevishly. “Anyway, so go ahead. I always wanted to toss that hideous thing out the window myself.” He could feel a mild headache coming on, and keeping his shields up had been more of a strain lately. Raven and Cain stopped to stare. 

“Charles, are you feeling all right?”

“Charlie? You don’t look so good. You’ve gone all blotchy around the ears –”

“Oh my god, Charles, you’re like white as ghost –”

The sudden rush of heat was too much, his vision going black and red and black again. Raven was behind him in a second, followed by Cain who elbowed her out of the way – “ugh, get away from him, Cain, you fucking mouthbreather.” “You’re going to drop him, freakshow, let me do it.” – and Charles thought he was going blind with fever, and wished he was deaf instead.

They managed to carry him over to the sofa – flat was better than sitting up – but the brocade upholstery was too hot, too itchy against his skin, which felt like it was on fire and bitten by thousand ants. He tried to burrow his head under the cushions while an embarrassing ache was building up in the bottom of his stomach, and he just had to rub it away, scratch the skin off his arms until it stopped itching, because he couldn’t grind away at the sofa, not with Raven here, and Cain – Cain was shaking him, prying his eyelids open to check for life, slapping him awake and demanding stupid answers to stupid questions. It was unbearably annoying and at the same time something deep inside was craving rough hands to hold him and just _get on with in_. Stupid Cain, stupid piece of meat, Charles felt something deeper down inside his mind snarling and clawing to get out, and abruptly Cain’s breath stuttered and he gasped, choking on too thick air, and the last coherent part of Charles pushed his stepbrother away from him before he could tear Cain’s eyes out of his head, or rip his shirt off his back. 

“Somebody call a doctor!” he heard Raven scream. “You, moron, run! Go get help! Charles is _dying!_ ” And almost stumbling, Cain ran from the room, yelling for Constanza, for Sharon, even for Kurt.

Charles wasn’t dying, he knew that. But short of breath, his clothes clinging to him drenched in sweat, Charles wished at the moment that he was. It was better than lying on the sofa, fighting back the waves of heat and chills rolling over him, and realizing, because Charles Xavier didn’t lie to himself, that his body wanted nothing more than to pull the familiar clammy bulk of his stepbrother on top of him and easing away the ache inside. 

His mind wander off to pluck at a jaded memory, of his mother and Kurt rutting on the floor of the library, and he started to laugh. If this was Fate's doing, she had a horrible sense of humor. 

 

§

  
Charles lay in bed, the sheets wrapped tightly around him as if he were a mummy. Dr. Sheridan had passed away in his sleep a few years ago before he could retire, and no one made house calls anymore, except in the movies. 

He'd refused to be taken to a hospital, only asked for a bottle of Tylenol and water, and put a mental bubble around his room so that everyone but Constanza would be repulsed. Raven pounded on the door anyway.

"Let me in, Charles! You're not contagious, I'm not going to catch anything, let me in!"

But she would. She would catch on to his terrible cravings, and Charles wasn’t sure if he wanted to die of shame first.

It was difficult to get a balanced, and above all, scientifically sound view on this whole business of alphas and omegas. The combination of hearsay, hush-hush, wild romantic projection, and unfounded speculation that permeated even the scientific community, made it an impossible topic to get a grip on. Charles had assumed, like most people, that the traits of alphas and omegas would manifest like a heightened second stage of sexual differentiation, along the lines of male and female. It was strongest in those with apparent mutations; Charles had assumed Sharon, being distinctly omega, was the one with a latent X-gene, but he had always assumed that he, being male, would manifest as alpha. 

Cain, at sixteen, and very bluntly human, showed no overt signs of being either alpha or omega, though Charles suspected his stepbrother was strongly in denial about his torpid sexuality, feigning a brutish interest in girls because his peers did, but not caring much for either sex.

For the first time in his life, Charles envied his stepbrother and his almost childlike distance from this whole unseemly matter of desire. That terrible _itch_ was burning him up on the inside and left him shivering with cold, and driving him to a mindless craving that left him rubbing desperately against the mattress. His mind flipped through a catalogue of candidates to furnish the scenarios, from school, from the soccer team, from the tennis team, teachers, movie stars, men, women, both, groups of them urging him on with terrible, humiliating words, imagined their hands on him, playing with his cock, arranging and spreading and spearing him from behind, taking turns, until he came spilling on the sheets. He had jerked off before, but now he was leaking copious amounts of clear fluid from the back, and he was too tired, flush and depleted at once with a dispiriting sense of degradation, to do anything more than press his face into his damp pillow and catch his breath before the next wave of lust overwhelmed him.

No, Raven wasn't coming in here to see this. 

After two days of the worst -- and, because Charles was honest with himself, mentally exhausting, but pleasurable -- ache and grind was over, Charles dragged himself into the bathroom down the hall. 

The house was quiet. Though exhausted, it was habit now to check off members of the family each somewhere in its cavernous gloom. 

He turned the hot and cold taps to fill the tub, hot enough to boil a lobster, and, feeling worn out and hollow inside, rifled the cabinets for an old bottle of raspberry bubblebath from when he was a child, and poured it in to its last drop.

The bubbles were fluffy and fragrant around him, and he dipped low to beard his face. The tears, when they came, were a relief, flowing down his face and cutting a swathe through the bubbles. 

The door pushed open without a knock, and Charles yelped and slid down further. His vision was obscured, and his mind was tired, but he knew it was Emma. Raven would have shouted first. 

"Why is it that whenever I walk in on you, you're down in the dumps feeling sorry for yourself?" 

_So don't walk in on me then, Miss Manners_ , he retorted. He was still better at sending than she was. "And by the way, I wasn't --" the rest was lost in soap and water, and he dunked his head to rinse it off and rose again. He shook his head at Emma, splattering her like a dog. "I _wasn't_ feeling sorry for myself."

She quirked an eyebrow. "Really?" and slammed back at him, _I'm disgusting and weak, and I'm going to die alone, nobody's going to love me, fuck me harder, harder, harder, I'm a filthy slut --_

"Emma!"

"I think most of the house just got drenched in the hot flash without the Charles Xavier signature on it. They think they just got a little frisky on their own because, honestly, honey, who wants to believe a fourteen-year old boy sent them panting like bitches as a side effect of his own heat? Oh the power of denial. Your mom and your stepdad are making the beast with two backs in the billiards room. Maybe you'll be lucky and get a new baby brother or sister."

Charles groaned. "And Raven?"

"Don't worry, sugar. Ugly stepsister came running over to fetch me, and she's been holed up in our kitchen ever since. Christian thinks her mutation might be containing a black hole where her stomach is. Don't you people ever feed her?"

"Thanks, Emma," and he added. "And Raven’s not ugly."

"Suit yourself, darling," said Emma smoothly, "though I didn't see her starring in any of your world class omega bitch porn."

"She's my _sister,_ , Emma." He was too tired for this, though having another mind swatting at him helped bolster his shields again and stop him from sinking into the mire of his own thoughts.

"That's right, the way that strange lump of a thing isn't your brother. He can keep that huge cock of his going at it for quite some time, can't he? Well, well, I suppose he has a sort of thuggish charm. Is that firsthand experience, or just your imagination? Because honey, you can do _so_ much better than him. Is it technically incest if you're not blood related?"

Charles slid down into the bubbles again. He was going to drown himself, it was easier that way. He was going to shrivel up in the water, swim down the drain and join a colony of mermaids in the Hudson river. He bet they didn't have nosy telepath girls living down the lane. What was the use of being disgustingly rich old money with a gothic monstrosity for a house if you still had neighbors down the street? And when did Emma get so good at picking his thoughts anyway?

"It's just the sex part, sugar," Emma said, though that wasn't very reassuring. "I pick up on those faster. It's practice, and besides, a lot more fun than school. After all, the moron sitting next to you probably has the wrong answer, so why waste the effort skimming the test off him."

"For the last time, Emma, I am _not_ going to help set up your telepathic brothel just to keep you from cheating on your school exams."

"Never say never, darling. Besides, look at you now, with all those pent up fuck-me urges. It's going to be worse, you know, every time you go into heat."

He sighed. "How often?"

Emma shrugged. She made herself comfortable on the shaggy rug, and trailed her fingers over the now lukewarm water. "I don't know, really. It's different at the start, and it's not always keyed in with my period. I've had four so far, over the past eighteen months. I suppose we could always get you a vibrator with a strong setting."

Charles winced. She was so frank about these things in her bored, matter of fact way, as if sex was just something to take care of, like brushing her teeth and finding jeans that fit well.

"I just thought it would be different, that’s all."

"What, magical?" Emma scoffed, and then seeing the bleakness on Charles's face, reached over and brushed his cheek with her thumb. "Oh, sugar. Don't take it so hard. You're just tired out. It's just biology. You know better than to believe in some kind of omega dream, as if some big alpha's cock is going to fuck you into happy times and fix your whole world." 

“Right, because one day he'll catch my scent, we’ll recognize each other by our souls, and once the imprint takes --"

"-- he'll keep you happily fucked and fat with babies, and you'll never ever want anything else," she finished with an acerbic laugh, and he ended up laughing along with her to stamp out that little fantasy, the twee one he kept close and hidden, one that wasn’t about being gang-banged by a group of leather wearing alphas who kept him naked on a chain and took him for rides on their motorbikes, and passed him around to be used as a fucktoy whenever they pleased. 

“My, my, my,” murmured Emma, “are you _sure_ you don’t want to go into business with me, Charles? We could make a fortune on your inner porn palace alone.” 

Charles groaned and splashed more water at her. “Keep out of my head, Emma. And why aren’t we drunk yet? I can’t believe I went into heat, jerked off over Cain, and I’m not even drunk yet.”

“I’ll go liberate some champagne,” she said easing to her feet. “You either refill on the bubbles or wrap it up, darling. Your family jewels are on display and I think neither the temperature nor the setting is right for optimal presentation.” As he reached for a bathtowel, Emma loosed a final parting shot as she snuck out the door. “If you want, you can always use your Cro Magnon stepbrother as a living dildo. We can practice mind-wiping him afterwards, though, by the way he looks at you, I don’t think he’ll mind horribly.”

 

Three weeks later, Charles caved and joined in on Emma’s ‘telepathic companion’ venture. It was mostly about projecting and keeping up a sexual fantasy that looked, felt, even smelled real. No real touching. Emma was better at this than she let on at first, and it became something of a competition between them, changing faces, and assembling ‘types.’ Magazine sleek and movie-star gorgeous at first, then with elaborate costumes and odd kinks. Reading up on them was an education in itself – Charles was bizarrely entranced by the one involving inserting a small octopus, while Emma was more interested in making up gravity defying lingerie that would never hold together in real life. 

It took them three months to put together a decent ‘portfolio.’

But the real obstacle was more mundane. For the business side to work, they needed to build a discreet, very rich client base, and a front through which to receive money. Luckily Emma said she knew someone from the club – Charles assumed she was talking about the Westchester Country Club – who would find them rich men with a penchant for risqué sex, and not rip them off too much. His name was Sebastian Shaw, and he was also a mutant.


End file.
